When you go to a new doctor, or to a solicitor, one of the first things they will do is take a history of events in your case. This happens in social work too, and "chronologies" play a key role in making sure everybody working on a case knows what's been going on in a child protection case.
It can be especially important when a child is likely to need to be moved to a safe place. The judgement to move a child from his or her home is a difficult one, and may well depend on choosing whether to give the child's carer the benefit of any doubt. This judgement can only be made properly if the history is known, which is why the courts insist on chronologies. Sorry to say, poor chronologies appear time and again as a factor in child deaths
It was with this in mind that I asked the Leader of the Council, the following on Tuesday night:
"What proportion of cases for children currently with a Child Protection Plan have an up to date and complete chronology (as required by section 9.4.7 of the Berkshire Child Protection Procedures)?"
After agreeing that chronologies were important (1), this is what she said:
"This practice can be evidenced through the most recently commissioned independent audit of 121 child protection cases in Targeted Services, the audit found that 87.1% cases had chronologies, of these 84.5% were satisfactory or better. These figures show an improvement from a partial audit undertaken in June 2007 where of 12 child protection case audited only 25% had a detailed and updated chronology."
I'm sorry to say that this kind of answer shows what we're dealing with. Let's look at it again. What it really says is that 87% of cases have chronologies, and of the cases that do, those chronologies are satisfactory 84.5% of the time. Doesn't sound so bad does it? Well, if one does the maths, it shows that only 73% of cases have a satisfactory chronology. Which means that 27% of them don't.
That equates to around 30 children.
Remember this is clear requirement in the procedures (which according to Cllr Lovelock in her answer to another question, everyone but five workers have been trained in), is required by the courts, and is needed for the team to act effectively to protect children
Maybe the question should be rephrased. Let's put it the way the barristers in a public inquiry would:
"Cllr Lovelock, are you telling us that two years after the death of a child, and one year after the serious case review findings were presented, and after six months of reportedly frantic activity, and despite everyone involved being by your own account fully trained, your children's safeguarding department is still not following its own basic procedures in 27% of cases involving children assessed as being at risk of harm?"
There really is no excuse for this.
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